Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region

Identifying and tracking the influence of industrial activities on streams and lakes is a priority for monitoring in Canada’s oil sands region (OSR). While differences in indicators are often found in waterbodies adjacent to mining facilities, the confounding influence of natural exposures to bitume...

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Autor principal:	Tim J. Arciszewski
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	MDPI AG 2021
Materias:	oil sands Alberta benthic macroinvertebrates monitoring streams lakes Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering TD1-1066
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/16f5f184b2024a3a8d271a988f833e46
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:16f5f184b2024a3a8d271a988f833e462021-11-25T17:31:07ZExploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region10.3390/environments81101232076-3298https://doaj.org/article/16f5f184b2024a3a8d271a988f833e462021-11-01T00:00:00Zhttps://www.mdpi.com/2076-3298/8/11/123https://doaj.org/toc/2076-3298Identifying and tracking the influence of industrial activities on streams and lakes is a priority for monitoring in Canada’s oil sands region (OSR). While differences in indicators are often found in waterbodies adjacent to mining facilities, the confounding influence of natural exposures to bitumen and other stressors can affect the identification of industrial effects. However, recent work suggests metrics of industrial activity at individual facilities, including production and fuel consumption, may be used in site-specific analyses to identify influence of the industry as a whole as well as individual operations. This study further examined the potential relationships between industrial and climatic variables on benthic communities from 13 streams and 4 lakes using publicly available data from the minable region and the Elastic Net (EN) variable selection technique. From the full set of possible industrial and climate variables, the EN commonly identified the negative influence of plant and fuel use of petroleum coke at the Suncor Basemine on benthic communities in streams and lakes. The fuel/plant use of petroleum coke at Suncor likely reflects the emission and regional deposition of delayed coke fly ash. Among the other industrial variables, crude bitumen production at Syncrude Mildred Lake and other facilities, steam injection rates, and petroleum coke stockpiling were also selected for some benthic invertebrate indices at some sites. Land disturbance metrics were also occasionally selected, but the analyses largely support the predominant influence of industrial facilities via (inferred) atmospheric pathways. While climate variables were also commonly selected by EN and follow-up work is needed, this study suggests that integrating industrial performance data into analyses of biota using a site-specific approach may have broad applicability in environmental monitoring in the OSR. More specifically, the approach used here may both resolve the long-standing challenge of natural confounding influences on monitoring the status of streams in the OSR and track the influence of industrial activities in biota below critical effect sizes.Tim J. ArciszewskiMDPI AGarticleoil sandsAlbertabenthic macroinvertebratesmonitoringstreamslakesEnvironmental technology. Sanitary engineeringTD1-1066ENEnvironments, Vol 8, Iss 123, p 123 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	oil sands Alberta benthic macroinvertebrates monitoring streams lakes Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering TD1-1066
spellingShingle	oil sands Alberta benthic macroinvertebrates monitoring streams lakes Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering TD1-1066 Tim J. Arciszewski Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
description	Identifying and tracking the influence of industrial activities on streams and lakes is a priority for monitoring in Canada’s oil sands region (OSR). While differences in indicators are often found in waterbodies adjacent to mining facilities, the confounding influence of natural exposures to bitumen and other stressors can affect the identification of industrial effects. However, recent work suggests metrics of industrial activity at individual facilities, including production and fuel consumption, may be used in site-specific analyses to identify influence of the industry as a whole as well as individual operations. This study further examined the potential relationships between industrial and climatic variables on benthic communities from 13 streams and 4 lakes using publicly available data from the minable region and the Elastic Net (EN) variable selection technique. From the full set of possible industrial and climate variables, the EN commonly identified the negative influence of plant and fuel use of petroleum coke at the Suncor Basemine on benthic communities in streams and lakes. The fuel/plant use of petroleum coke at Suncor likely reflects the emission and regional deposition of delayed coke fly ash. Among the other industrial variables, crude bitumen production at Syncrude Mildred Lake and other facilities, steam injection rates, and petroleum coke stockpiling were also selected for some benthic invertebrate indices at some sites. Land disturbance metrics were also occasionally selected, but the analyses largely support the predominant influence of industrial facilities via (inferred) atmospheric pathways. While climate variables were also commonly selected by EN and follow-up work is needed, this study suggests that integrating industrial performance data into analyses of biota using a site-specific approach may have broad applicability in environmental monitoring in the OSR. More specifically, the approach used here may both resolve the long-standing challenge of natural confounding influences on monitoring the status of streams in the OSR and track the influence of industrial activities in biota below critical effect sizes.
format	article
author	Tim J. Arciszewski
author_facet	Tim J. Arciszewski
author_sort	Tim J. Arciszewski
title	Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
title_short	Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
title_full	Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
title_fullStr	Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
title_full_unstemmed	Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region
title_sort	exploring the influence of industrial and climatic variables on communities of benthic macroinvertebrates collected in streams and lakes in canada’s oil sands region
publisher	MDPI AG
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/16f5f184b2024a3a8d271a988f833e46
work_keys_str_mv	AT timjarciszewski exploringtheinfluenceofindustrialandclimaticvariablesoncommunitiesofbenthicmacroinvertebratescollectedinstreamsandlakesincanadasoilsandsregion
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Exploring the Influence of Industrial and Climatic Variables on Communities of Benthic Macroinvertebrates Collected in Streams and Lakes in Canada’s Oil Sands Region

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